FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT SALARY CAP - PAGE 2

First-year captain Mike Richards blamed himself yesterday for the Flyers' late-season doldrums and suggested he is learning the requirements of that role - just as general manager Paul Holmgren is learning to manage the salary cap. "I can take responsibility for not preparing the team," Richards said. "But it's a learning process, and I'm going through a lot of this for the first time. Next year, hopefully, I improve on it. " The Flyers were 11-10-2 in the last six weeks of the season and lost home-ice advantage in the playoffs on the last day of the regular season, when a point would have meant starting at home.

WHEN CONTRACT negotiations between James van Riemsdyk and the Flyers started to heat up the past few weeks, van Riemsdyk had just one request for agent Alec Schall. He wanted a contract extension that wouldn't clog up the Flyers' salary cap down the road, in order to allow enough money to be spread around to keep the team competitive. Van Riemsdyk inked a 6-year, $25.5 million contract extension, which was completed on Monday but finally registered by the NHL yesterday. "I couldn't be happier," van Riemsdyk said on a conference call.

The most interesting period of the Flyers' off-season is less than a week away: Free agency is almost upon us. General manager Paul Holmgren is on a quest to find a No. 1 center, which remains the Flyers' last significant hole to be filled this summer. Will it be Scott Gomez or Daniel Briere? Or maybe even Michael Nylander? Forget Chris Drury: The San Jose Sharks cleared salary-cap space to sign him at the NHL draft in Columbus, Ohio, by trading away two players, Vesa Toskala and Mark Bell.

The Baltimore Ravens landed the biggest prize of the first day of free agency, signing wide receiver Derrick Mason, whose 96 catches for Tennessee last season led all NFL wide receivers. Meanwhile, Cleveland traded defensive tackle Gerard Warren, the third overall pick in the 2001 draft, to Denver. The Browns will get just a fourth-round draft choice for the underachieving Warren. Indianapolis released tight end Marcus Pollard, one of the key cogs in the Colts' potent offense.

The New York Jets yesterday declined to match Jacksonville's offer sheet to free-agent tight end Kyle Brady, making the former Penn Stater a Jaguar. Brady, 27, will receive a five-year contract worth $14.4 million, ESPN reported, which would make him the highest-paid tight end in the NFL. His average yearly salary would be $2.88 million, surpassing the $2.87 million salary of Denver's Shannon Sharpe. The Jets' refusal to match the offer to Brady, their transition free agent, came a day after New York signed free-agent tight end Eric Green from the Baltimore Ravens.

The abridged edition of what has transpired between baseball owners and the Major League Baseball Players Association in the 20 months since they have discussed a new collective bargaining agreement goes something like this: Owners: "You don't care at all about the financial mess we've gotten ourselves into, you don't believe us, and you're not willing to make any sacrifices to help us out. " Players: "You're right. " And so the clock begins for real today. At high noon, via a telephone conference call vote, the 28 player representatives are expected to set a deadline to strike, a date that could kill off one of the more exciting and attended baseball seasons ever.

They didn't say yes. They didn't say no. The response of the major league players to ownership's latest luxury-tax proposal on salaries as a means to end baseball's three-month-old strike was to ask for some time to look it over. "We want to make sure we have a full understanding of what it contains," Phillies righthander Curt Schilling said after nine players and seven representatives from an ownership group met for nearly five hours yesterday at a hotel near Dulles International Airport.

Heading into tomorrow's NBA draft, the 76ers have solved one of their key questions of the summer, the status of potential all-star forward Clarence Weatherspoon. Owner Harold Katz granted Weatherspoon restricted free-agent status over the weekend. That means the team's top scorer and rebounder last season can play the NBA market starting Friday. Don't expect Weatherspoon to do much wheeling and dealing with his new- found leverage, however. For one thing, both he and his agent, Jim Sexton, have expressed Weatherspoon's desire to stay with the Sixers.

PITTSBURGH - Amid all of the speculation surrounding Ian Laperriere yesterday, that his career might be in jeopardy after visiting a head-trauma specialist in Pittsburgh last Friday, the veteran had a clear message. "My quote is: I'm not retiring and I'm just trying to feel better," Laperriere wrote in a text message to the Daily News . No one has closed the door on Laperriere's brief but storied career in Philadelphia, but it does appear that the 36-year-old may not skate again this season.

Troy Vincent, who has a knack for it, put the whole salary-cap thing into perspective. "You always have room," the Eagles' veteran cornerback said. "You can always sign who you really want to sign. " The context of the question-and-answer was Donovan McNabb's brand-new, talk-of-the-town 12-year contract. What did it mean for the Eagles as a franchise? What did it mean for the other players? With a limited amount of money to spend each year - the NFL's dreaded salary cap - didn't McNabb's good fortune mean bad fortune for someone else?